Both the BCS and the number of offences recorded by police - released today by the Home Office - show a 7% fall in overall crime in 2009. The number of offences recorded by the police in 2009, 4.4m, represents a fall of 340,000 in the past year and is now below the crime level recorded in 1997 when Labour came to power.

As Alan Travis writes today:

The sharp fall means the strong upward pressure on the crime rate due to the effects of the recession expected by Home Office criminologists has been avoided. The long-term fall in the crime rate since 1995 is now one of the longest on record.

Recorded crime by police force area, English region and Wales, percentage change between 12 months to December 2008 and 12 months to December 2009 | '+' data for London Region includes the City of London | SOURCE: HOME OFFICE